World's second richest man gets Web name back for free

GENEVA (Reuters Life!) - The world’s second richest man, Mexican telecommunications tycoon Carlos Slim Helu, won control for free on Wednesday of a Web address in his name that an Indonesian had tried to sell him for $55 million.

The United Nations’ copyright agency WIPO said an arbitrator for the dispute service that it runs on Internet addresses had ruled that the site, www.carlosslimhelu.com, had been registered in bad faith and must be transferred to the businessman.

Documents presented by Slim’s lawyers as cited by WIPO showed the owner of the address, identified as Ahmad Rusli of Jakarta, had threatened he would link it to a pornographic website unless he got the money he was demanding.

Rusli, who operates a site called Rusli.Cyber.com, told the arbitrator by e-mail that he had wanted to protect the address for Slim and that the threat was simply aimed at getting the tycoon’s attention to his cash request.

In Mexico, Slim owns trademarks using only Carlos Slim, his first name and father’s name, for his wide-ranging business operations extending across Latin America and into the United States.

Helu is his mother’s name and under common practice in Spanish-speaking countries this is appended to the first two in official documents and in public and media references.

Slim, also known for philanthropic work, is chairman of the former state-owned Mexican telephone company Telefonos de Mexico and two other major companies, including a large financial conglomerate, Grupo Financiero Inbursa.

In March last year, the U.S. business magazine Forbes ranked him as the world’s second-richest person, behind U.S. financier Warren Buffett and ahead of Microsoft founder Bill Gates. Forbes set Slim’s fortune at approximately $68 billion.